The Basics: Some aliens come to earth and land in Los Angeles. They're on a mission to eat up a bunch of jerks, so it's lucky for them they dropped down in that specific spot; they'll never go hungry. These aliens are also virtually unstoppable. Nuclear bombs, stealth fighter planes, all the weaponry on hand in the U.S. military's arsenal, none of that stuff can slay these creatures. To do that, the characters discover, requires good old fashioned hand-to-hand combat. Well, hand-to-tentacle. Anyway, remember that next time you think all it'll take to vanquish the monster is a bigger gun.

What's The Deal: This pretty awful movie is from a team of visual effects-making brothers, Colin and Greg Strause, who've been making stuff look awesome for several years now. And they're getting better as feature directors (their last one was the barfy AVPR: Aliens vs. Predator--Requiem). Now, when I say "better" I don't mean that this one is any good. It's just not as bad as AVPR. These guys love to make monsters and it shows, because the aliens are beautifully designed, like asymmetrical Frank Gehry buildings with tentacles. And the effects are impressively crushing, loud and fireballish. But then it's like they remembered there also had to be people in the movie so the monsters would have someone to kill, and they just decided to go surfing the day all that boring stuff was being cast and shot.

Best Kill: They're all pretty great, but the one where a character gets sucked up into one of the alien's starfish-shaped tentacle mouth-holes, then vomited back out, then re-eaten, is a brilliant stroke of gross-out genius.

Stupid Human Tricks: The great thing about the non-alien characters here is that they are absolutely empty. They sneer and party and sneer some more and then stop right in the middle of the mayhem to be petulant about relationship difficulties. There's actually an attack scene in which Donald Faison has to take time out of trying to escape with his life to address his girlfriend Brittany Daniel's anger over him cheating on her. Him: "We'll talk about it later." Her: "Yes, we will."

Other Thing Named Skyline That This Film Will Never Take The Place Of: The famous chili that you put on spaghetti. But the movie would have be pretty much Avatar for that to happen. And maybe not even then.

Comments (18)

Dennis - 11-12-2010 9:41 PM

One Star... Really bad. The horrible Saturday SyFi Movies are 4 stars compared to this.
Summary: Aliens land, rip the heads off of Humans, eat the brain, and then create another Alien. The End. Dave's 2 Stars is being very, very gracious. Save your money, see Avatar again.

Henry Rollins - 11-12-2010 10:33 PM

I'd hate for Dave to publish a review without any comments and since he hasn't enraged any religious zealots or Glenn Beck fans, there's likely to be none for this film. Great work Dave! I wasn't going to watch this festering bucket of putrescence, but your evaluation has cemented it.

Glenn Gaylord - 11-13-2010 1:31 AM

I love Cincinnati's SKYLINE CHILI even though I'm pretty sure the meat is some sort of alien life form. Having said that, the aliens in it are far more compelling than anything in SKYLINE the "movie".

Adam - 11-13-2010 3:18 AM

The actors name is Eric Balfour not Eric Falfour.

Eric - 11-13-2010 9:52 AM

This has to be one of the worst movies of 2010. There is no plot, the acting is mediocre at best. Most Sci-Fi movies have some attempt at reality, this had none. The military reactions were way off and there seemed to be no point in what the aliens were doing. The only redeeming quality was the special effects, and with how horrible everything else was, it was not worth it. Don't bother putting this in your netflix queue when it comes out on DVD.

mike - 11-13-2010 9:37 PM

I want my money back!
And if any movie producer out there reads this....do all of us a favor, if these guys ever come to you with another script (I will loosely call that which they write as a script)... shoot them, it will save all of us a very horrable and agonizing time spent at the theater.

Jason Banks - 11-13-2010 10:15 PM

The absolute worst movie in years. It didnt really have a plot. I totally wasted my money. I really hope someone will read this and pick another movie or stay home and watch paint dry. Three thumbs DOWN!!!!

Mike - 11-14-2010 10:50 AM

No question the worst movie of the twenty first century. It's like going on a date with the girl of your dreams and then finding out she's a man. Why would anyone allow someone to waste ten million dollars on a plot that's worst then a porno? Wow! I vote this goes in the same category as Trolls 2.

Leslie - 11-14-2010 5:05 PM

Usually when a film critic says a movie is bad.. they're wrong. But this time..They are sooo right. The effects are great but that's it. And what about how it ended? The guy turns alien and saves his wife in the alien's ship? Is there going to be a part 2? Where did the aliens come from & why do they need other people's brains? If the point to the movie was to show us that aliens really could take over the world, the creators of this movie succeeded.
THIS MOVIE SUCKED

Josh - 11-14-2010 6:41 PM

I really liked this movie I knew the story wasn't goin to be there. I went in for the effects alone. Can't wait for number two. I loved the halo reach kind of ending LOL.

Skyline Chili? - 11-15-2010 10:28 AM

I want to hear more about the chili.

Stephen - 11-15-2010 11:30 AM

The ending had no redeeming quality in it aliens eatig our brains woow really come on thats so 1950s basic people cmon :(

Cindy Smith - 11-17-2010 5:59 AM

everyone is being to hard on this movie. we went to watch this movie to see action with lots of monstors destroying the city. the trailers showed just that. it was very entertaining and really cool special effects. the drama involved with the actors was not the best, but that is not why we were there, right? we loved it! worth seeing on the big screen for fun!

George - 11-17-2010 12:08 PM

This movie is junk!!! After it was over there were people standing in the parking lot complaining about the money they wasted. People who didn't know each other. When was the last time you saw that!

Aaron - 11-17-2010 5:19 PM

I chose to see this movie instead of seeing megamind with wife and daughter, it seems that my little girl got the last laugh. This movie was horrible instead of laughing and smiling with my daughter i was frustrated and angry for wasting the last 2 hours of my life looking at the worst alien movie i had ever seen. Save your money see a cartoon.

John Kaye - 11-20-2010 7:22 PM

Terrible. I hope somebody has enough sense to read these reviews instead of believing all the movies hype. What a waste of special effects and the acting was atrocious. I feel bad for the people who spent money making this movie with a plot that sucked eggs. A good story line might have pulled it off, but no one thought to write one. You can't disguise bad acting or a story line with special effects. Who wrote this anyway? They need to face a firing squad of aliens that can take bullets with out it bieng phased, but a few swings of an axe and a flurry of punches? Come on guys WTF?

Dean - 11-20-2010 11:19 PM

I wanna know how much money was spent on the slime alone ... this was THE most STUPID movie about complete NONSENSE ... an alien was raping a pregnant woman .... seriously was she going to stay in that slimey cavity till she reached term and then marry her now alien poop snot covered boyfriend? Next time the Kraus Bros wanna spend 10 million on a movie ... give me 5 million and I will make a better movie on my camcorder at home! At least the popcorn tasted good.

James - 11-21-2010 9:31 AM

So, I decided to see this; one, because I like Eric Balfour, and two, I will see just about anything since I'm a movie buff...but anywho, it seemed "okay"-not great...and the ending...WTF?!. The ending just left the possibility for a sequel, though I hope that's not the case. It's kinda like Independence Day crossed with the T. Cruise WOTW remake with a little Matrix thrown in...the tentacles on the critters reminded me of The Matrix... I'm looking forward to Battle: Los Angeles. (hope it's better...lol)

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